Monday, March 18, 2024

SPRING IN THE ORCHARD

 I got the orchard area all cleaned up, it's SO nice now.

It's a multistep process.  First, I edge around each raised bed.  Then I go into each bed and edge inside (careful of course to avoid the base of the trees/bushes).  Then I use the little electric push mower to get in between the beds a bit more.  Lastly, I get the big Zen Machine and go around as much as I can and it "cleans up" all the grass from the prior events.

In the end, it looks like this and it makes us happy.  Now in the upcoming weeks, I'll add soil as needed and top off with mulch and it will be picture perfect and good for the the season.  But for now, we're happy and the trees are happy and blooming.

Speaking of blooming...


Nectarine...


Plums...


Cherry blossoms (bush cherries)...


Fig tree (no blooms but happily leafing out after almost not making it last Summer)...


Both pear trees...


Blueberries (two varieties) are flowering...


This is the mayhaw, flowers and buds all over...


One apple tree...


And the other apple tree!

Spring is definitely doing its thing!

Sunday, March 17, 2024

GOOD BIRTHDAY FOOD AND HOBART ST PATRICKS DAY SUNDAY

Yesterday was 2nd Man's birthday!  So we had some good food for sure.


Regular readers might know this but new ones might not, his favorite meal that I make for him every year on his birthday, is a tuna casserole.  Don't judge, we know it can have a negative connotation, but I do make a really good one...problem is (now) we have to eat heart healthy.  We're cutting back on salt, trying to reduce saturated fat to as little as possible and staying away from white flour in lieu of wheat/whole grains.

So, I had to reinvent it using healthy ingredients.  This is made with no fat cheddar cheese, vegan mayonnaise that I found and we LOVE it, Greek yogurt instead of heavy cream, heart healthy cream of mushroom and whole wheat pasta!  Oh and organic tuna in water two cans to add the extra Omega 3's.  It's just about as healthy as it can get.

It tasted wonderful and he loved it!


He made his birthday cake and it was a regular cake...but we limited ourselves to one slice each and the rest will be taken to work.  It was a white velvet cake with vanilla cream filling and mascarpone frosting.

Delicious!


Gotta have some celebrating with sparkling rosé wine.


Hobart laid there while we ate and celebrated in his own way.  By sleeping.


And check this out.  You know me, I could NOT pass this up!  My goal is to have an old farm truck to represent every holiday, ha!  Too cute!

"May you have warm words on a cold evening, a full Moon on a dark night, and the road downhill all the way to your door..."   - Irish blessing

Happy St. Patrick's Day to all and especially a Happy Birthday to 2nd Man.

#notspoiled


Friday, March 15, 2024

CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL

...that are causing problems, ha!

Last weekend when I mowed, I encountered this in a remote spot on the property:


The grass/ground was torn up in these two spots.  We'd have to guess feral hogs?  Thankfully, there are no other signs of this anywhere else (and I was all over the property on the mower) and nothing close to the house.

Are there other animals that could do this or most likely hogs?

Then, there was this on the porch:


We had a bag of mulch that was NOT like this when we left the weekend before, ha.  Something had torn into it in several spots.  Raccoons?  Opossums?  Armadillos?  They are small openings and on the bottom of the bag, so it would appear that it was not anything large.

Any thoughts on what might have decided to try a snack of bark mulch?

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

A GIFT OF BOOKS

In the mail the recently, we received a box.  And another box.  And more!


A very sweet friend is paring down her book collection and sent us these boxes of gardening books!  There are books on butterflies, bird watching, building birdhouses, flowers, vegetables, companion planting, heirloom planting, edible wild plants, and even a book on heat tolerant plants (definitely something to know here).

Several of them are geared toward gardening and planting right here in our part of the state.

I think 2nd Man was jealous that they were all for me (he is the cookbook gatherer in the household, ha) but was still excited to be able to add to our library.


Monday, March 11, 2024

BACK ON THE ZEN

I had to drive out to the farm at lunch (well, lunch and a half, ha) on Friday because the mower was delivered.  Even though I was going to be out there on Saturday and it would be OK to sit out overnight, there was rain in the forecast on Friday and storms on the radar.

I drove out there and back Friday morning to put it in the shed.  There was heavy dew and fog earlier (you can see the wet tire tracks) but it never rained.  Of course, if I had not gone out there, it would have poured, isn't that the way it always works?

Saturday I went out by myself to do yard work.  2nd Man had work to do on a project that was due Sunday.  I have an app on my watch that makes an emergency call with one button push, sort of like an app version of a "Life Alert".  I have 911 programmed in it and it also calls both him and 2nd Family who lives at the front of the property.  I felt safe.

I also cleared with the doctor to do yardwork duties and he said it was fine.  In fact, it was funny because he said "oh a Deere riding lawn tractor? That's like a luxury car, you are fine".  I also asked about the weedeater and he said I should be fine with most anything.

When I got there it was 52 degrees with a strong wind.  A bit chilly.  I got things ready for my projects and by then it had gotten warmer and it was perfect.

Key.  Check.

Mower refreshed.  Check.

Full tank and backup gas.  Check.

Here is part of the driveway, well, halfway through it, before...

...and here is that same angle "after".  Looks nice and no longer overwhelming.

Here is alongside the garden fence.  It was crazy tall.  This is before...

...and this after.  I will go back another time with the weedeater along the fence.  That brush on the right will be removed at some point as well.

I was also able to get the trails we have created around the property.


It's always nice to keep these clear.


It lets us access various places to do trimming, gather dewberries, look for interesting things and even lets the wildlife move around easily.

Lastly, here is the front yard area...

Before...


...and after!

Much better!


Here it is, the official record of the first mow of 2024.

1 hr 40 minutes of...


This!

Had a blast and it's good to be back.



Sunday, March 10, 2024

GOOD FOOD AND HOBART SUNDAY

 Time for some good food!


We had some excess yellow squash and zucchini.  2nd Man decided to make a sort of ratatouille.  No eggplants or sliced tomatoes but he had some (no salt) canned tomatoes and sauce.  So he sautéed some onions added the tomatoes and put the squash and some herbs, covered it and cooked it on the stove top.


Then he pan seared some salmon and topped it with some parsley and a few sprinkles of Aleppo pepper (my new favorite seasoning, ha).  It was wonderful and super healthy.


Dessert was honey Greek yogurt (a new flavor for us to try).  Here, we served it with fresh blueberries, blackberries and some honey drizzled over the the top.  It was delicious!


Hobart was unimpressed by our cooking, he was just happy to be on the couch, on a fuzzy, warm blanket doing what he does best; sleeping.  Of course we let him, because...

#notspoiled

Friday, March 8, 2024

DAYDREAMING ABOUT PLANT THINGS

 Recently, I've started subscribing to seed and plant catalogs and having them sent to the farm address.  That way, we can start getting regular mail out there and it'll be nice to get something fun out of the mailbox on a regular basis instead of tax bills, insurance and offers to buy our house/land, ha.

 I enjoy a glass of wine or in this case, some wonderful hot tea, and a quiet night or two of perusing through the pages of a catalog.  They are so fun and give us hope for the future.  In the end, isn't that what all planting is about?  Hope for the future?  We stick the seeds/plants in the soil and we hope we get to enjoy the end result of our hard work?

Six catalogs came.  I would have subscribed to just as many more but those companies are website only, no paper catalogs.  It's amazing how many no longer offer print catalogs.  I'm still old school and enjoy a physical copy in my hands, one that I can dog ear or highlight or circle the heck out of on the inside.

Anyone have any good gardening catalog ideas?  Tools, plants, seeds, general gardening, it's all good.  We don't mind on getting on some mailing lists like that, ha.

Because isn't daydreaming half the fun?


Thursday, March 7, 2024

WONDERFUL GIFT

Sometimes a surprise and unexpected gift just warms your heart, and that's what happened with these!

We got a surprise package in the mail, opened it and found these amazing cooking cutters!

We posted HERE about cookie cutters that I got for 2nd Man to add to his collection.  We have some for various holidays but hadn't even thought about any that are farm related!  Now we have a "cow", "sunflower", "red barn" AND three sizes of an old "farm truck"!

WOW!  Thank you!

Several of you also emailed us recipes for cookie doughs (thank you for those as well) and so we'll have some fun baking to do this Spring.  2nd Man can do the baking and I'll do the decorating.  We will keep the cards they came on, so I can remember how to decorate them properly, ha.


Tuesday, March 5, 2024

SOUR ORANGE NARANJA AGRIA IS DOING GREAT

We posted HERE recently about getting the sour orange.  When we went out there, I took it out of the container it came shipped in and put it into a large clay pot using special potting soil for citrus...

To say it's happy would be an understatement.  In just a week it has exploded with blooms...

A few are opening and getting ready to turn into...


...actual fruit!  See the little one right there in the middle of the photo?  Yay!

We don't have to worry about popping off all the blooms because we're not going for root development while it is in a container.  From reading, about two or three per branch is fine and you should take the rest off after enough have set fruit.  So we'll keep an eye on it, but we're thrilled because it's so happy.  We might get a few sour orange to play with later this year.

We're OK with that!

Now marinade first?  Or a margarita?
Decisions, decisions!


Sunday, March 3, 2024

GOOD FOOD AND RODEO HOBART SUNDAY

 LOL!  Here's some good and healthy food we had recently and of course, Hobart!


So we had leftover homemade BBQ sauce (healthy version) and the last of the pickled onions I made (hmm, time to make some more, ha).  So 2nd Man pan seared some Mahi-Mahi and we had it over a bed of mixed greens (spinach, arugula, etc) and then topped it with the BBQ sauce and some pickled onions. It was so good (and good for us!).  This fish really tastes almost like chicken so it worked well the the BBQ sauce.

We are enjoying all this fish in our diet!


We also love our vanilla Greek Yogurt, it's so versatile.  Here I dished it up and topped it with some fresh fruit and some graham crackers.  Delicious!


 Since the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo started this week, we decided to dress Hobart for the occasion.  I put this bandana on him while he was laying on his quilt.  Um, it doesn't look like he was amused, ha.  So, we took it off and let him sleep.  Because...

#notspoiled